Working together

Nurses General Nursing

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Do you work in a place where everyone helps each other or where you pretty much are on your own? I'm not talking RN does things for LPNs patient that the LPN can't do or CNA doing baths, helping to bathroom, vital signs, etc.

Where I work, we if one of us has a minute while someone else is busting their behind to do 10 things, we'll try to pitch in and help them. For example, if the charge nurse is still trying to do patient care and I'm caught up, I'll go ahead and print off the sheets for the next shift that she usually does. Or if a pump is alarming in someone else's room and I hear it, I'll take care of it for that nurse. If someone calls for pain meds & their nurse is in another room, I call her to see if it's time for more and go give it for her. There've been times when I've been swamped and gotten a new admission. When I'm finished assessing the patient and come back to the nursing station to put in the orders, I've found that another nurse has done it for me. Those kinds of things are what I'm talking about.

I've found that when we do those kinds of things, it not only makes things run smoother, but it also kinda bonds us together more like a team.

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I don't see much or any of that, and we are so overloaded that usually one has all one can do to keep up with the workload that one has, never mind being able to help anyone else out.

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We are overloaded also...with about 8 patients each on a busy Orthopedic med/surg floor. Sometimes, I don't even get to pee until I'm about to go home, LOL. And, it's not every shift that we can do things to help each other. But, when someone can take a second or two away from what they're doing to help someone who's even busier, it really means alot. They are more likely to help you out when the situation is reversed.

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Sad to say that around here, we're clique-ish. If one of your clique members needs help, they've got it. But if they're not in the clique you're in, you may as well forget it.

I'm not a clique member, so I just help (most of the time). But there are certain nurses whose idiosyncrasies just don't blend well with mine, so I stay far, far away from them. The rest of the folks, I just help when I have time and go about my business.

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Sad to say that around here, we're clique-ish. If one of your clique members needs help, they've got it. But if they're not in the clique you're in, you may as well forget it.

I'm not a clique member, so I just help (most of the time). But there are certain nurses whose idiosyncrasies just don't blend well with mine, so I stay far, far away from them. The rest of the folks, I just help when I have time and go about my business.

I know what you mean. Most of us on our shift are just one big clique, LOL. But there is this one nurse who's only been there for 4-6 months who acts like she knows it all, is above everybody else, always talking about how she's always been used to being in the supervisor position, yada yada yada, and pretty much sticks to herself and never tries to even fit in, much less ask for any help or even speak to any of us. She had the nerve to tell our NM that no one ever helps her or asks to help. Well, any of us would be more than happy to if she acted like she even thought we existed. She's never asked for help and NEVER has offered it.
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Specializes in Rehab, Med Surg, Home Care.

Luckily, our unit has been a supportive environment so far. I don't think we'd survive if we didn't help each other. I think this has done more for staff retention than anything the administration could do. But I've noticed that all it takes is for one person to start grumbling about "How come MY assignment is so tough tonight?" and it starts to fall apart...so far though, we've managed to overcome these types, but I don't take this kind of work environment for granted, having worked in "me first!" types of workplaces before. I'm willing to work at it.

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The one thing I love about my unit is the teamwork. Anytime we have a free minute, we make the rounds to see if anyone needs help. I work in a very busy ICU and I can tell you that not one of us (or our patients) would make it through the day without our teammates help. For example, last week our team had VERY high acuity with essentially 4 of 10 patients needing one on one care (but we can only have two one on ones per team) so I had a busy, busy patient and another not so busy patient. I was trapped in the sick patients room basically all day while my teammates did the assessments, meds, dressing changes, and bath on my other patient (all without having to be asked to do so)! Had it not been for my co-workers, my other patient would have been neglected. However, my co-workers know that in the same situation, I would do the same thing for them!

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Specializes in critical care; community health; psych.

Sadly, no. There's not much of that kind of spirit as a whole. I have to qualify that though. Among the techs, it's different. We do check up on each other.

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Specializes in Med-Surg, Trauma, Ortho, Neuro, Cardiac.

Yes, but usually only if asked. I work with nurses who when done will sit on their butt while others run around and won't offer to help. But they will jump up and gladly help when asked. Others won't sit down without asking others if they need help.

I also hate the nurses that run around and then at the end of the shift martyr like say "I worked like a dog and no one helped me". My first question is "did you ask for help", "well no, people should have asked me". Me: "Sorry some of us don't read minds, next time just ask."

Fun environment I work in. LOL

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Our shift is overall great..we have one new nurse working with us that hasn't quite gotten the 'help out' spirit yet..lol..but she will :)..we were sooooo busy last night with no cna and boo-coo total care pts..I was in a room wrestling to clean a bigggg time code brown..yanno the kind..total bed change..have to wipe down the rails cuz the pt had 'played' in it :/ and this new nurse hunts me down to tell me one of my pts needs a prn...I hold up my poop covered gloves and say I'm a LITTLE busy right now and ask her nicely to give the Lortab for me cuz I may be a while...lol..I don't think she wanted to, but geez she was sitting at the desk reading the paper when I started my poop mission...she'll catch on...as we ALL know, we ALLLLL need a little help every now and then :)

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Where I work, we if one of us has a minute while someone else is busting their behind to do 10 things, we'll try to pitch in and help them. For example, if the charge nurse is still trying to do patient care and I'm caught up, I'll go ahead and print off the sheets for the next shift that she usually does. Or if a pump is alarming in someone else's room and I hear it, I'll take care of it for that nurse. If someone calls for pain meds & their nurse is in another room, I call her to see if it's time for more and go give it for her. There've been times when I've been swamped and gotten a new admission. When I'm finished assessing the patient and come back to the nursing station to put in the orders, I've found that another nurse has done it for me. Those kinds of things are what I'm talking about.

Yep....the floor i work on is like this. I really am proud of my floor. Always helping each other out. We definately hang IV's or give pain meds, etc. to other pts, if that nurse is in the break room at lunch. We all know that "lunch time" is our time to chill out and want to be uninterupted(especially on busy hell nights), so all we do is check with the nurse, say we'll do it, and chart it, and on our way we go. We work as a team, definately.

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About half will try and help if you ask- the other half will not ask for or give help.

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